1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the papermaking and related arts. More specifically, the present invention is an industrial fabric of the on-machine-seamable variety, such as an on-machine-seamable press fabric for the press section of a paper machine.
2. Description of the Prior Art
During the papermaking process, a cellulosic fibrous web is formed by depositing a fibrous slurry, that is, an aqueous dispersion of cellulose fibers, onto a moving forming fabric in the forming section of a paper machine. A large amount of water is drained from the slurry through the forming fabric, leaving the cellulosic fibrous web on the surface of the forming fabric.
The newly formed cellulosic fibrous web proceeds from the forming section to a press section, which includes a series of press nips. The cellulosic fibrous web passes through the press nips supported by a press fabric, or, as is often the case, between two such press fabrics. In the press nips, the cellulosic fibrous web is subjected to compressive forces which squeeze water therefrom, and which adhere the cellulosic fibers in the web to one another to turn the cellulosic fibrous web into a paper sheet. The water is accepted by the press fabric or fabrics and, ideally, does not return to the paper sheet.
The paper sheet finally proceeds to a dryer section, which includes at least one series of rotatable dryer drums or cylinders, which are internally heated by steam. The newly formed paper sheet is directed in a serpentine path sequentially around each in the series of drums by a dryer fabric, which holds the paper sheet closely against the surfaces of the drums. The heated drums reduce the water content of the paper sheet to a desirable level through evaporation.
It should be appreciated that the forming, press and dryer fabrics all take the form of endless loops on the paper machine and function in the manner of conveyors. It should further be appreciated that paper manufacture is a continuous process which proceeds at considerable speeds. That is to say, the fibrous slurry is continuously deposited onto the forming fabric in the forming section, while a newly manufactured paper sheet is continuously wound onto rolls after it exits from the dryer section.
Referring, for the moment, specifically to press fabrics, it should be recalled that, at one time, press fabrics were supplied only in endless form. This is because a newly formed cellulosic fibrous web is extremely susceptible to marking in the press nip by any nonuniformity in the press fabric or fabrics. An endless, seamless fabric, such as one produced by the process known as endless weaving, has a uniform structure in both its longitudinal (machine) and transverse (cross-machine) directions. A seam, such as a seam which may be used to close the press fabric into endless form during installation on a paper machine, represents a discontinuity in the uniform structure of the press fabric. The use of a seam, then, greatly increases the likelihood that the cellulosic fibrous web will be marked in the press nip.
For this reason, the seam region of any workable on-machine-seamable press fabric must behave under load, that is, under compression in the press nip or nips, like the rest of the press fabric, and must have the same permeability to water and to air as the rest of the press fabric, in order to prevent the periodic marking of the paper product being manufactured by the seam region.
Despite the considerable technical obstacles presented by these requirements, it remained highly desirable to develop an on-machine-seamable press fabric because of the comparative ease and safety with which such a fabric could be installed on the press section. Ultimately, these obstacles were overcome with the development of press fabrics having seams formed by providing seaming loops on the crosswise edges of the two ends of the fabric. The seaming loops themselves are formed by the machine-direction (MD) yarns of the fabric. The seam is closed by bringing the two ends of the press fabric together, by interdigitating the seaming loops at the two ends of the fabric, and by directing a so-called pin, or pintle, through the passage defined by the interdigitated seaming loops to lock the two ends of the fabric together. Needless to say, it is much easier and far less time-consuming to install an on-machine-seamable press fabric, than it is to install an endless press fabric, on a paper machine.
One method to produce a press fabric that can be joined on the paper machine with such a seam is to flat-weave the fabric. In this case, the warp yarns are the machine-direction (MD) yarns of the press fabric. To form the seaming loops, the warp yarns at the ends of the fabric are turned back and woven some distance back into the fabric body in a direction parallel to the warp yarns. Another technique, far more preferable, is a modified form of endless weaving, which normally is used to produce an endless loop of fabric. In modified endless weaving, the weft, or filling, yarns are continuously woven back and forth across the loom, in each passage forming a loop on one of the edges of the fabric being woven by passing around a loop-forming pin. As the weft yarn, or filling yarn, which ultimately becomes the MD yarn in the press fabric, is continuous, the seaming loops obtained in this manner are stronger than any that can be produced by weaving the warp ends back into the ends of a flat-woven fabric.
It should be noted that the bending of the yarn back to create the loop, particularly about a small radius, can result in undesired stresses in the yarn portion creating the loop. This results in weakening the yarns at the seam such that they may fail before the yarns in the body, which is undesirable.
In still another technique, an on-machine-seamable multiaxial press fabric for the press section of a paper machine is made from a base fabric layer assembled by spirally winding a fabric strip in a plurality of contiguous turns, each of which abuts against and is attached to those adjacent thereto. The resulting endless base fabric layer is flattened to produce first and second fabric plies joined to one another at folds at their widthwise edges. Crosswise yarns are removed from each turn of the fabric strip at the folds at the widthwise edges to produce seaming loops. The first and second fabric plies are laminated to one another by needling staple fiber batt material therethrough. The press fabric is joined into endless form during installation on a paper machine by directing a pintle through the passage formed by the interdigitation of the seaming loops at the two widthwise edges.
In each case, spiral seaming coils may be attached to the seaming loops at the ends of the fabric by interdigitating the individual turns of a spiral seaming coil with the seaming loops at each end of the fabric and by directing a pintle through the passage formed by the interdigitated yarns and seaming loops to join the spiral seaming coil to the end of the fabric. Then, the fabric may be joined into the form of an endless loop by interdigitating the individual turns of the seaming coils at each end of the fabric with one another, and by directing another pintle through the passage formed by the interdigitated seaming coils to join the two ends of the fabric to one another.
A final step in the manufacture of an on-machine-seamable press fabric is to needle one or more layers of staple fiber material into at least the outer surface thereof. The needling is carried out with the press fabric joined into the form of an endless loop. The seam region of the press fabric is covered by the needling process to ensure that that region has permeability properties as close as possible to those of the rest of the fabric. At the conclusion of the needling process, the pintle which joins the two ends of the fabric to one another is removed and the staple fiber material in the seam region is cut to produce a flap covering that region. The press fabric, now in open-ended form, is then crated and shipped to a paper-manufacturing customer.
In the course of the needling process, the press fabric inevitably suffers some damage. This is because the barbed needles, which drive individual fibers of the staple fiber material into and through the press fabric, also encounter and break or weaken the yarns of the press fabric itself. And, when the seam region of the press fabric is being needled, at least some of the MD yarns which form the seaming loops and, if present, the spiral seaming coils will be somewhat weakened. Damage of this type inevitably weakens the seam as a whole and can lead to seam failure. In this regard, it should be realized that, in the case of a spiral seaming coil, only a small amount of damage could lead to premature seam failure. Because a spiral seaming coil extends transversely across the fabric at the seam region, a break at any point can weaken the seam for a considerable portion of its length, and cause it to unzip or come apart.
In addition to press fabrics, many other varieties of industrial fabric are designed to be closed into endless form during installation on some equipment. For example, papermaker's dryer fabrics may be joined into the form of an endless loop during installation on a dryer section. Dryer fabrics may be so joined with either a pin seam or a spiral seam, seams which are similar to those described above. Other industrial fabrics, such as corrugator belts, pulp-forming fabrics and sludge-dewatering belts, are seamed in similar fashions and are susceptible to seam failure for the same reasons.
Moreover, spiral seaming coils are available in only a limited number of configurations. That is to say, they may only be obtained in a limited number of diameters and pitches (number of turns per unit length). Clearly, an alternative to spiral seaming coils would be greatly appreciated by industrial fabric designers.
A papermaker's “link belt” fabric is disclosed in PCT/US98/05908 and comprises hinge wires extending in the cross-machine direction and a plurality of ring link elements extending in the machine direction. Each ring link element opens in the cross-machine direction and encloses at least two of the hinge wires. The ring link elements may either be solid, or continuous, or split, the latter being used, preferably, to make repairs in a damaged belt. This publication also includes descriptions of two methods for manufacturing the paper machine belts.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,469,221 discloses a papermaker's fabric comprising pintles extending in a cross machine direction and links snapped onto the pintles so that the links extend in a machine direction. Variously shaped link elements are shown. Each link element has holes at its ends for accepting neighboring hinge wires. The holes are not closed completely, but rather are slit to permit them to be expanded and snapped around the hinge wires.
The link belts disclosed in PCT/US98/05908 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,469,221 have the ring link elements only oriented in the machine direction, and not in the cross-machine direction. Further, the hinge wires are only shown to extend in the cross-machine direction, and not in the machine or diagonal directions. With such limited configurations, fabric strength and resistance to needling damage are compromised.
The present invention addresses these shortcomings in the prior art by providing an on-machine-seamable fabric having improved strength and resistance to needling damage.